


make you dirty, make me clean

by neonheartbeat



Category: Knives Out (2019)
Genre: Aftercare, Anal Plug, Blood Kink, Consensual Kink, Cunnilingus, Dirty Talk, F/M, Femdom, Financial Domination, Forced Orgasm, Gen, Humiliation, Marta Cabrera is a Top, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Pegging, Punishment, Ransom Drysdale Being an Asshole, Spoilers for Knives Out, Vibrators, Vomiting, Whipping, anyone else have a thing for sex-wrecked ransom drysdale well GUESS WH, consensual noncon play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:02:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21702643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neonheartbeat/pseuds/neonheartbeat
Summary: Hugh Ransom Drysdale has been in prison, serving a twenty year sentence.Marta Cabrera has been adjusting to her family's new life as millionaires, living in Harlan Thrombey's mansion.Unfortunately, Ransom is out on parole after only two years, and has no place else to go...
Relationships: Marta Cabrera/Ransom Drysdale
Comments: 186
Kudos: 953





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A huge shout out to the Knives Out sin bin twitter groupchat. I couldn't have done it without you. 
> 
> Heads up, CW for consensual noncon/noncon roleplay kink. I didn't want to tag it as noncon, because it's consensual noncon, but if someone getting off on pretending they loathe the person they're banging OR someone playing at "you owe me for x, now do this sex thing for me" are triggers for you, Dead Dove Do Not Eat.

The House did not have a name.

That was something strange, Marta mused as she sat on her favorite balcony, sipping her favorite coffee out of her new favorite mug. Usually big old country houses had names, like Eaglehart Manor or Lake Run or Rivendell (no, wait, that was from Lord of the Rings), but this one didn't. She supposed she'd probably have to name it something if she wanted to pass it on to her kids, if she ever had any; it sure as fuck wasn't going to go to the Thrombeys or their extended brood after she'd kicked it.

She'd had extensive private security on the grounds for months—almost a full year, actually, after the initial official Moving-In Date and they'd definitely ran across some sketchy characters trying to sneak around the borders of the property. A fence had gone up, then had to be topped with some electric wiring, and once that had started being patrolled by guys with dogs they'd stopped seeing any trace of the Thrombeys.

Cute dogs, though. Not as cute guys: they reminded Marta too much of shit she saw on the news, walls, kids in cages, uniformed assholes who Only Took Orders, and even though the dogs were cute she eventually let the guys go. It wasn't worth Mama having so much anxiety over, and even though they'd gotten all her paperwork done and in order and she was a bonafide citizen now, that old fear still lingered, as it had a perfect right to. Alicia had decided to move out a couple months back, stating she wasn't going to live in a creepy old house like this, full of "spooky dolls and shit" but they were covered on her tuition costs _and_ the costs of her own apartment, so that was nice. Mama lived in the whole east wing, and at first they'd tried to run the place on their own, but quickly figured out that unless they wanted to spend every second of the day cleaning, they probably needed help, so help was hired: two maids who came in weekly. Mama refused to let anyone but herself touch the gleaming, top of the line range in the kitchen, so a cook was out of the question.

One thing they did kind of need was a gardener, though. The place was rambling and huge and with every passing day the New England countryside threatened to swallow the walls, encroaching ever further. Marta looked at it and thought she might have known what the Puritans saw when they looked into the forest: she could almost believe the Devil was lurking in the shadow of the trees. Even Mama would mutter and cross herself after a peek out the windows during the rain. It was fucking _spooky._

Anyway, the Thrombeys had run off with their tails tucked between their legs: Joni off to California with Meg in tow, Linda back to New York without her estranged husband (the divorce was going well, last Marta had heard), Walt had gone to Texas with Donna and that little chinless creep Jacob (Marta had taken some pleasure in making fake Twitter accounts and reminding him every time he tweeted about "preserving Western civilization" that his grandpa had left all his money to an immigrant, and she didn't even care that he blocked her every time; she could make new ones as fast as he could smash that button, and she had endless time on her hands now). The only remaining scion of the Thrombey family was That Asshole, who she refused to even acknowledge with a name in her mind: he was simply That Asshole, that Sweater-Wearing, Smirking, Murderous Fucking Asshole, and past being delighted that he'd earned a twenty-year prison sentence, he definitely did not enter her thoughts. It should have been way more, like, _way_ more, in Marta's opinion, but he'd had expensive lawyers, thrown at him by Linda and Richard.

She'd seen him at the trial, since she'd been called as a witness on a couple of separate occasions, and gotten a great view of him in his bright orange jumpsuit, handcuffed and chained to the table. His beard had grown out, but his hair was still combed perfectly, the dark brown sheen gleaming in the courtroom fluorescents, and she'd had to take a moment before being cross-examined.

The attorney trying to examine her had found himself completely stumped against her inability to be dishonest coupled with her self-assuredness, which she owned that day, because, hey, she had on a brand new outfit for this trial that she _definitely_ hadn't bought as a big fat Fuck You, It's Still My Money to That Asshole and to Linda and to Richard, who sat on opposite sides of the courtroom, and no, she was not going to puke on it today. And after all, that had been for the best, because the judge and jury found Hugh Ransom Drysdale guilty on two of his three charges and sentenced to twenty years.

Marta hadn't seen him since that day, two years ago, and she was fine with that. Really. She was. She hated his guts, and absolutely did not find him attractive in any way whatsoever. She'd often found herself, at some of the parties that Harlan had thrown, playing a silent game with herself called "is that white dude hot, or is he just tall and rich?" and nine out of ten times, well. Anyway, why the hell was she sitting out here on the balcony with a now-empty mug when she had more coffee inside?

Going back in was like entering a warm, silent cave. The carpet muffled her footsteps and the still-gaudy eighties wallpaper smothered the hall in florid overdecoration. Marta had wanted to get the whole interior redesigned, but had come to actually like the over-the-top décor. It reminded her of Harlan. The only thing changed had been the bedroom she'd picked for herself, in the west wing. She drifted down the back stairs, down to the front hall, and to the kitchen, where more coffee was waiting in the French press amid the homey smells of Mama's cooking.

"Oh, good," said Mama, seeing her. "I was about to call you down. Your Tia Gloria is sick and I'm going to visit her in Florida for two weeks. You'll be okay here by yourself?"

Marta set her mug on the counter. "Tia Gloria? She's always sick. Last month it was a cold, and she swore up and down she had pneumonia and was dying."

"Well, this time she has a _real_ doctor, not one of those idiot college students she gets to make the notes for the pharmacy, and he says she has acute bronchitis, so I am going down."

"Okay. When are you leaving?"

"Flight is tonight. You should buy a private jet. It would be so much easier."

Marta sighed. "Mama, we've discussed this. Private jet means money for gas and for a pilot and for people to make sure it's always working, and rental space for a hangar."

"You _have_ money _,_ Marta."

"Not private jet money. I have a publishing business to run, too, in case you forgot. It's not gonna kill you to fly first class on a commercial flight."

"First class. You spoil me," said Mama, still smiling, and kissed her daughter's head. "Okay. Alicia is going to come by and get me in four hours. Behave. No parties, no boys."

* * *

To the question "but what am I going to do in a house by myself for two weeks?" there had used to be an answer, and that answer had been, "go to work, make myself dinner, watch Hulu for an hour, and pass out" until she'd found herself living here. Now, Marta mostly lounged around, worked out when she wanted to, read, drifted through the halls pretending to be a woman from the 1890s whose husband had tragically died, and experimented with Tasty recipes off Buzzfeed's Instagram. Now that she could afford to fuck up an omelette, it was fun to try new things, and it was also weirdly liberating to have the money to _not_ have to do anything she didn't want to do.

An hour after Mama had left, she was standing in the kitchen listening to Lizzo and wearing flannel pajama pants and a tattered old Henley, and she had just flipped a pancake perfectly, when a tentative knock on the kitchen door startled her out of her impromptu Martha Stewart impression. She went to the door and opened it to the sounds of the dogs barking.

 _He_ was standing there. Him, that Fucking Sweater-Wearing Asshole of the Hundredth Degree, wearing the same stupid cashmere sweater he'd worn the day he was arrested (not that she'd paid any attention to _anything_ he ever wore, and definitely not those figure-hugging sweaters) and his jeans, and his six hundred dollar boots, and Marta's first reaction was to haul off and punch him right in his perfect, horrible nose.

Hugh Ransom Drysdale choked and staggered against the door frame, blood leaking from his nose and dribbling over his cream-colored sweater. "Fuck," he rasped through his hands. "Yeah, okay, I kinda did have that one coming."

"I have a fucking restraining order, you son of a bitch. You're supposed to be in _prison._ " Marta shook her hand furiously and snatched her phone out of her back pocket, and Ransom jerked back upright and spat blood out into the shrubbery.

"Hey, hey, hey. Wait. Hold on. Don’t—don't call the cops, okay? I'm on probation. I swear to God. Look." He yanked a piece of paper out of his back pocket and thrust it at her, and she opened it, incredulously reading the print on the paper.

It was real. He was on early release, some bullshit about good behavior and a good ethic in prison and holy _shit,_ Marta had never wanted to kill anyone more. "I hope you can afford to pay your lawyers for the work they did to get you this," she snapped.

"I did that work myself," Ransom fired back, and as he leaned into the light from the kitchen she noted that he looked haggard, rough around the edges, none of the plush smoothness that hundred-dollar moisturizers and a life of leisure had afforded him. He even had stubble, as if he'd shaved a couple days ago, and Marta was no Benoit Blanc, but she figured that he'd gotten released at least a week ago, and since then been without a razor—or access to a shower, she mentally amended as she caught a whiff of him. He smelled sour and stale and rank with BO, and yet he was still standing here clinging to his pride in his good behavior.

Marta picked up the knife she'd been using to cut onions and pointed it at him. "You get ten seconds to explain why you're on my doorstep. Starting now."

"Okay, look," he said, spreading his hands. "I don't have anywhere to go. My parents split up, Mom thinks I need a tough life lesson and Dad thinks I'm a failure, and they gave me a measly two hundred for food and bus fare before shoving me out their doors."

"All of which does not explain why you are at my kitchen door knocking after you tried to _murder me_ ," spat Marta.

Ransom gave her a sideways look. "You're still mad about that?"

"Why are you _here?_ "

"I—" His face fell slightly, and he looked off to the side, half-mumbling. "I need a job."

Oh, sweet satisfaction. "What was that? Couldn't hear you."

"I said," Ransom said, a little louder, "I need a job."

She could still call the police. He might still try to kill her—although it would be out of pure spite, not like he hadn't tried before, but hey. She could call the cops, or she could stab him and claim self-defense, _or_ —and this _or_ was very, very tempting—she could give him a terrible, disgusting, dirty job, like chimney-sweeping or dog poop cleaning, and take glorious two weeks of pure satisfaction watching Ransom Drysdale performing manual labor under her nose, indebted to her.

Maybe she understood why rich people were assholes. Having someone terrible owe you something was the best feeling _ever,_ which was probably why, against her better judgement, she stepped back. "Okay. You need a job? I need someone to spread about a thousand pounds of manure in the east rosebushes tomorrow morning."

Ransom blinked at her as if he wasn't sure if she was joking or not. "What's the pay?"

Marta managed to keep a perfectly straight face. "You get to live in the gardener's quarters above the gardening shed. It even has running water and plumbing. And you'll get to stay there, if I'm satisfied with your work. If I'm not, you might have to sleep in the attic, and it _is_ October, so."

She watched as a war between pride and the desire to not be homeless played out on Ransom's face, and his shoulders finally sagged. "Fine. I accept."

Marta pointed at the stove with her knife. "If you want some of these pancakes, you better take your shoes off and come in."

"Take my shoes off? What is this, Japan?" Ransom stepped a filthy, mud-caked shoe into the kitchen and yelped in indignation as Marta whapped the side of his head with a towel a millisecond later.

"I said take your shoes _off_ , you fucking barbarian. My mom just mopped this floor."

"Jesus! Fine." He slid out of his shoes, leaving them outside, and slunk to the stovetop in his socks while she followed behind.

* * *

After he'd been fed and shoved back out the door with the key to the gardener's shed, Marta locked every door in the house, called the nearest landscaping company and ordered enough manure to seemingly blanket the house, then went to bed. From her window, she could see the gardener's shed, a single light on in the attic space. Out of curiosity, she padded out of bed and watched: it wasn't too far, and she could see Ransom peeling out of his dirty clothes layer by layer, then stood up, bare to the waist.

She had seen Ransom Drysdale without a shirt twice: once at a summer pool party, and once by accident when she'd been coming into the house after some cocktail thing and found him necking with a girl in the hallway, both of them half-undressed. The woman had been some… aspiring author, Marta thought, trying to remember, and thought Ransom was a good way in to getting her vampire mystery book published, but unluckily for her, Ransom never truly gave a shit about anything but getting his dick wet when it came to hookups. Both times, she'd seen sculpted, perfect planes of muscle born out of long gym hours and supplements, and had rolled her eyes and walked away to hide the flush of embarrassment on her cheeks.

Now, though, as Marta looked out her window and into his, she could see that his body had changed to something leaner, something tougher. She hadn't known what she'd expected—prison tats? It wasn't too far of a stretch to assume he'd fallen in with those white nationalist prison gangs—but from what she could see, there was no ink.

 _What am I doing?_ Marta backed away from the window. She was fucking _ogling_ a man who'd tried to murder her in cold blood in front of witnesses. Quickly, she got back into bed, yanking the covers back up over her head…and gripping the kitchen knife she'd brought up, under her pillow. Just in case.

* * *

The next morning dawned just as overcast as the previous one. Marta stood on the balcony after signing for the manure, wrapped in a cashmere blanket, and watched Ransom shovel load after load of cow shit into the flowerbeds in hideous navy coveralls.

It smelled like shit, and it tasted like victory.

* * *

The week drew on. Ransom made a point out of not looking at her, focusing completely on every single thing he was told to do, and performing his duties with as much care as he had used to treat his Beemer. He even detailed her car, which she hadn't known he knew how to do, and pressure-washed the back steps, and when she looked down her nose at him and ordered him to take the dogs for a walk he did that too, struggling with the leashes as the animals tried to nip at him. After a couple of days, the vindication didn't feel good anymore. She just felt like she was punching down, and wasn't that a weird feeling, after so many years of being stepped on and overlooked? But there was Ransom, scruffy and haggard and trying his best, and if he looked at her directly at all it was with an expression she couldn't quite figure out.

On Saturday, Marta gave up. It was raining, and he was outside weeding one of the rose beds, and she stepped out with an umbrella on the back porch. "Get inside," she called out.

He looked at her blankly, soaked to the skin, and holding a clump of muddy weeds in his left hand. "What?" he shouted back.

" _Inside_ , you dumbass. It's pouring."

Ransom didn't wait to be told twice. He dropped the weeds and hurried over to the porch, water dripping out of his hair as he edged past her like a dog trying to come in from the rain. Marta followed him and popped the umbrella shut. "You're getting my floor dirty. Now my feet are gonna be dirty."

"You want me to lick them clean?" Ransom shot back at her, a touch of the old attitude leaking through, and as the words left his mouth Marta found herself spiraling into a mental pit completely full of the things she wanted him to touch with his mouth, and went red to the ears with shame.

"You wanna go back outside in the rain and go sleep in the shed?" she spat, not angrily enough to stop him from tilting his head and giving her That Look, the look he gave people when he'd figured them out.

"No. You wanna send me out there?"

"I just fucking might, if you keep being a—a—dirty fucking _pig_."

The effect those words had on Ransom was incredible. He went pale, then flushed deep crimson before he took a step away from her and leaned on the counter top before spitting out, "Don't you _ever_ call me that again."

And Marta, slightly dizzy with whatever new weapon she suddenly found herself possessing, remembered the day she'd stumbled into a conversation in the library, something between Walt and Richard about Ransom spending thousands on some financial domination website, and _then_ she said the fateful seven words that sealed what happened next for eternity.

"Give me your fucking money, dirty boy."

Ransom yanked himself off the counter and flopped over to stare at her, looking like he'd been punched in the gut. " _What_ did you just—"

"You heard me. The rest of your two hundred that Mommy and Daddy gave you for bus fare. Give it to me."

His face was really an incredible shade of red. "It was four hundred. Two hundred each," he stammered.

Marta extended her hand out, palm up. "Even better. Give me the rest of it. Now."

Ransom's hands dug into his pockets and out came a worn wallet, and out of the wallet came a fifty, a twenty, and a handful of fives and ones that slapped down into Marta's hand. "There," he said hoarsely.

"You had four hundred and you spent three-twenty on fucking bus fare and food?" Marta pocketed the cash. "Jesus. You're fucking dumb as shit, you know that?"

"I know," he blurted out, ears red. "I know, I'm stupid, I'm a dumb fucking rich spoiled asshole—"

She raised an eyebrow. "Don't forget arrogant and cocky. Oh, and the part about arson and murder. You're so lucky I let you stay here, when I could call the cops any minute on you for violating your parole."

"Don't," he whispered, real fear in his eyes. "Marta."

Levelling with his gaze, she hissed, "That's Ms. Cabrera to you, you dirty, murderous little pig. I have half a mind to make you give me every last penny and have you sleep in the rain. I don't even make the dogs sleep outside." Ransom's face twisted into a grimace, and before she knew what was happening, he let out a hoarse little cry, hips jerking against the counter as his knuckled turned white in their grip. It took a moment, but a wet stain began to seep through the gusset of the coveralls, and Marta fixed him with the most disgusted look she could muster. "Did you just come in your _pants?_ "

"I never claimed to have great self-control," he muttered, shooting her a sideways look. "Are you...are you gonna kick me out?"

For the life of her, Marta didn't know why she said, "No. Go upstairs and get a shower. And shave."

"Okay."

"And then go into the bedroom on the second floor, end of the hall, and wait."

" _Oh_ —okay," he said, almost stumbling over his own feet in an effort to get to the door.

* * *

"There's going to be some ground rules," said Marta, sitting on the armchair in her bedroom that she liked the most. She'd frantically changed into a robe and nothing else, but he didn't need to know that. Ransom sat on the other chair, half on the edge, alert and hyperaware in a towel and nothing else, his clean-shaven face looking so like the old Ransom that she found it a little hard to focus.

"Right," he said, knee bouncing.

Marta leveled him with a look. "You don't sleep in here with me. You don't sleep in the house. I don't trust you to."

Ransom nodded tightly. "Okay. What else?"

She chewed on her lip. "I'm in charge. You don't ever get on top of me, or fuck me. I do what I want to you, and you take it." Ransom inhaled raggedly, his eyes dilating. "Is that—"

" _Yes,_ that’s good, that's okay."

"One last thing. You don't get to come until I say you can."

His shuddering exhale was loud enough to fill the room. "Jesus Christ," he said. "Who'd have thought you had it in you?"

"You never bothered to see what I had in me," she shot back. "You don't even know where I'm fucking from."

He tilted his head just so, seemingly weighing his options. "Okay. Where are you—"

"No. You don't get to ask me that. Get on the fucking bed."

Ransom stood, his body gleaming in the light from the bedside lamp, and walked to the bed, resentment pouring from every line of his leaned-out body. "I'm trying to be nice," he said, sitting on the edge of it with the towel still tucked around his hips.

"No, you're trying to make yourself feel better. Like you're a good person. But you're not." Marta stood and walked to the bed, pushing him onto his back as she straddled his hips. "You're a fucking asshole, Hugh Ransom Drysdale."

He squinted up at her. "Yeah? So what does that make _you_?"

She slapped him. Hard enough to leave a red mark on his cheek, and hard enough to get a choked, angry noise out of him, but not hard enough to bruise. "I didn't ask you for your opinion," she snapped, and shifted her hips to find a very obvious erection somewhere under the towel, pressing into her thigh. "You like getting smacked, huh?"

Ransom glared up at her. "Oh, fuck you," he said, his damp hair falling over his eyes. "I don't have to take this."

"Yeah, you fucking do, if you want a place to live and a roof over your head and food." Marta didn’t wait for him to respond, but crawled up his body so that her knees were planted by his head. "I assume you know how to eat pussy."

His blue eyes were almost black, his eyes were so dilated. "Of course I know how to eat a woman out. I'm not a total idiot."

Marta raised an eyebrow. "Good. Get to work. Don't use your hands. And if you say a single fucking thing about 'spicy Latina coochie' I'm kicking you into the yard buck naked."

"Oh, God," he said, sounding strangled, and then her hips were tilted over his head and he had disappeared into the folds of her robe, and his mouth was on her like she was the only food in a desert.

Marta prided herself on being good at controlling her emotions. It was a necessary skill to navigate the world as a woman of color, and even more necessary when in close proximity to the Thrombey family. There was a difference between masking your true thoughts and lying, so she'd never had issues with puking over it, but _now,_ with Ransom Drysdale's tongue slipping into places she'd forgotten she'd had, she was finding it very hard to act like he was doing a mediocre job.

"Oh, my God," she whimpered instead, jerking her pelvis forward. His nose mashed into her clit, and she squeaked as a jolt of sensation shot up her body. Why the hell did this feel so _good?_

"Mmm," said Ransom, his lips opening somewhere under her robe. One large hand tentatively slipped up past her knee, and she slapped it away, her eyes fluttering open.

"I _said_ you don't get to touch me," she gasped, breathless. "Not until you make me come."

Ransom huffed warm air across her bare skin and redoubled his efforts, licking, moving, sucking. Marta clamped her teeth down on her bottom lip, determined to not make a single sound of satisfaction, but somehow his tongue had found her clit and he was pushing it _hard_ back and forth. She held on as long as she could, but finally let go, and let out a single little gasp as she crested her peak and came crashing down across Ransom's cheeks and mouth, her thighs tightening on either side of his head.

When the world had stopped being an explosion of technicolor confetti and her heartbeat had returned to something passably normal, she rolled off him, and he emerged, red in the face and very damp, from under her robe. "I guess it's been a while," he said, tongue flicking out across his lips as if he liked her taste.

"Shut up," she said, but there was no real heat in her voice. "Do it again. Use your hands this time."

He dutifully rolled to his knees and thumbed at her swollen flesh, slipping his index finger in, then his middle. He had. He had. _Very_ big fingers. Marta clutched her comforter in both fists. "I've wanted to do this for a while," he said quietly, eyes fixed on where his fingers were going and not on her face. Marta sucked in some air in a hitching little gasp. "Probably since, uh, the second time I met you. You had on that—that button-down blue shirt you probably got off a clearance rack somewhere, and you looked—you looked—"

"This sentence better end in a compliment," Marta panted, staring at the ceiling.

Ransom's hand began to pump gently, and she made a noise she definitely hadn't wanted to make. "You looked good and clean and pure and nothing like anyone I'd ever met, and I wanted—part of me wanted to make you dirty like the rest of us and the rest of me wanted you to make me clean. Like. To—to get inside you, make it rub off on me, it pissed me off so _much_ —"

"I'm not a fucking Brillo pad," she gasped, one thigh straining with effort. "And I don't _care_ what you want."

Ransom's jaw clenched, the muscle under his eye twitching, and he added another finger, making Marta gasp and buck her hips. "Tell me you hate me," he whispered, his other hand creeping up her belly, toward her chest. "Tell me I'm shit, tell me I'm—"

"I hate your guts," she panted, eyes squeezed shut as she rocketed toward Orgasm Number Two. "I fucking _hate_ you, you cocky asshole, you spoiled rich idiot, you shithead, you—" It hit like a freight train this time, and she shrieked through it, clapping her thighs together and trapping his hand where it was until she was finished, and Ransom watched her avidly, as if he couldn't get enough of every little micro-expression on her face. As the endorphins all ebbed away, she sat up, feeling vaguely unsettled. "You want your turn?"

Eagerness dawned across Ransom's face, and she noted that his nose was not, in fact, perfect: there was a bump at the top, just at the level of his eyes. "My—my turn?"

"Yeah. You can go jerk off in my bathroom. I even have lotion you can use." She waited for his face to fall in disappointment before snorting. "I'm kidding. Go get me my vibrator out of the drawer in there and bring it here."

"You better not shove anything up my ass," Ransom said before sliding off the bed and making for the bathroom door.

Marta rolled her eyes. "What, too insecure to even try the wonders of the male G-spot?"

"No," Ransom said, coming back in with her plain purple-and-white Durex that she'd bought ten years ago at a Duane Reade, "the prep time is not worth the orgasm. Trust me."

Now _that_ was a fascinating thought. She shelved it for another time. "Lucky for you, nothing is going up your ass today. Lie down."

He gave her a suspicious look, but lay down, and when he dropped the towel she saw he'd been hard for probably as long as it had taken her to get off twice, but before she could focus on that she had to just…take in the size and shape and…all of it. Ransom was fairly well endowed, bigger than most she'd seen (not that she'd seen a lot, and she'd only had PIV sex like…once, in college) and thick enough that she wasn't sure she could close her hand around him. He wasn't circumcised, and the gleaming wet head was dribbling fluid all over his lower belly, flushed dark pink. "Looks painful," she said. "How long have you been waiting?"

"Um," he said, eyes flashing from her to the wall to the vibrator. "Probably since you said that you were gonna do whatever you wanted to me and I had to take it."

"You're such a masochist," she informed him. "You go to those, what, those BDSM clubs?"

"No. Too much risk I'll be recognized—I mean, that _was_ the issue before—" and both eyes shut as he inhaled sharply, annoyed. "Just get me off."

"I don't get off rude little men who demand shit from me," Marta said firmly.

Ransom swallowed, his throat bobbing visibly, and opened his eyes. " _Please_ get me off."

"Maybe I should make a fourth rule. You're not allowed to touch yourself at all unless I'm in the room. You want that?"

"Holy _shit_ ," he whimpered, his dick bobbing up and down and leaking even more as his cheeks turned red.

"Yes? We can do that if you keep mouthing off. Anyway." She twisted the base of the vibrator, turning it on a low setting. "I'll tell you what I'm going to do, because I'm feeling generous today. I'm gonna press this against your cock, and you're gonna come with just that. No touching, no other stimulation."

"I can't—coming in my pants was a _fluke,_ " he began, jerking his head up and his eyes flying back open, but she clicked her tongue.

"You can and you will. Because when you do, you'll get to touch my tits."

"Ohhh, my God," said Ransom, head falling back onto her bed. "Okay. Okay. I'll try."

"Good boy," she said, and didn't wait for him to answer before gently pressing the vibrator to the base of his cock.

Ransom's hips lifted off the bed and he grunted, a little taken aback by the sensation. "Uh," he said, squeezing his eyes shut. "Feels kinda—nice."

"Good." Marta twisted the vibrator again, kicking the frequency up a notch, and Ransom twitched, gasping a little as she rubbed the smooth surface up and down the underside of his swollen cock.

"How—how many settings, levels—"

"I'm not telling you," she said, pressing the vibrator to just under the base of the head. Ransom yelped in shock and gripped the comforter, every muscle in his arms standing out.

"Huh," he choked.

"You like it?" Marta twisted it again, up to the third level of intensity, and Ransom _moaned,_ outright moaned, and every muscle on his belly bunched up with the effort of remaining in place. "There's plenty more."

"Jee-he-hesus," he panted as she rubbed up and down, up and down. "No—stay, stay up at the t-tip—"

"Like this?" Marta kicked it up another notch and pressed it to the underside of the head again, and Ransom let out a ragged little shout. One of his knees kicked up reflexively, almost hitting her. "You kick me, and I really will make you go jerk off in the bathroom, and no tits for you."

His agony was almost palpable. " _Shit,_ shit, I'm sorry—"

"I know. Shut up." Another twist, up to level five, and he was shaking, teeth bared. The vibrator had ten levels, but Marta wasn't planning on telling him that until after. "You really are an ungrateful, dirty little brat. Out here kicking me when I'm trying to do you a favor." She had an idea, one she'd picked up in med school, but one she'd never tried in the field, so to speak. One hand went down his side, to his crotch, through the rough, dark brown hair there, and behind his balls. Ransom stiffened, but she rubbed circles into his thigh with her thumb until he relaxed as much as he could again, and she stroked the thin skin there gently. "You _are_ gonna come for me," she whispered in his ear, bending down so he could look down her robe, "and you're gonna thank me after." God, she hoped it was true: _prostate stimulation can be achieved by pressing on the perineum._

"Please," he choked out, and Marta deftly nudged the vibrator up to another level, then pressed it against the head of his cock and pressed up firmly with her other hand at the same time.

Ransom's reaction was probably the most gratifying thing she'd experienced all year. He jerked his chin up, eyebrows tilted into a little inverted V of ecstasy and mouth dropping into an O of shock as wet ropes of cum splattered across his stomach. "Uhhhh," he groaned, as he kept coming. "Fuuugghh, aaah-ah-ah—" His eyes were wet, and he sucked at his lips as he turned his head back and forth, trembling.

Marta continued milking it for a couple of minutes, until he whimpered with overstimulation, then took her hands away and switched the vibrator off. Ransom was deadweight, flopped out across her bed with tears in his eyes and a red, wet mouth as he blearily sought her out through the haze of euphoria. "Feel better?" she asked.

"Uh," he managed.

"Don't let it be said I never keep my promises." She stripped out of her robe, and that was enough to make him half-sit up, eyes focused as well as he could focus them on her breasts, before she came to lie down beside him. He rolled over with great effort and reached up, cupping one tenderly in a shaking hand.

"Knew you had to be hiding something great under all those ugly shirts," he managed a minute later.

"Say another word about my shirts again and I'll beat you with a wooden spoon."

"Is that a promise?" he asked, a slow, lazy grin spreading across his face.

She smacked him across the chest. "Get up and go get dressed. The living rooms need to be vacuumed."

"Yes, ma'am," he said dutifully, and sat up with a groan. "Anything else you need?"

Marta allowed herself to smile. "I'll think of something. Get to it."

"Yes, Ms. Cabrera," he said, and slipped out of the bedroom, taking the towel with him.

Marta stretched luxuriously. _Ransom's End_. That would be a good name for this house. She should probably have a big sign made, and wouldn't Mama be shocked when she came home and...

_No parties. No boys._

"Shit," she said aloud, and began the guilty scramble to cover all evidence of their sordid hookup, because Mama was back in a week and she was totally fucked if she didn't figure something out _right now_ , but until then...okay, maybe she could push that to the back burner for now and deal with Ransom for another week. Or longer. She could hide him in the shed and just have him putter around at a distance. Mama wouldn't recognize him with the beard and a hat or something. Her eyes weren't great anyway. "What are you _thinking_?" Marta said under her breath. "You hate Ransom, you _hate_ him, you..."

Telltale nausea curdled in her stomach.

Ten minutes later, she stared into the bathroom mirror, blinking rapidly and washing her mouth out with water as the toilet flushed.

"God _dammit_ ," said Marta Cabrera.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> back by popular demand [drumroll] the Knives Out Sin Bin Is In. Enjoy.

Marta was starting to get pissed off with Ransom. 

Sure, when Mama came home, she'd managed to hide him in the basement for a while, and sure, Mama's eyesight wasn't that great, and she didn't recognize him when she _did_ finally see him in the garden one day, but now he was just getting cocky about the whole situation, and that absolutely would not stand.

They hadn't had another sexual encounter in over a month, and Marta rapidly oscillated between being relieved that he hadn't tried to force the issue and upset that he wasn't advancing, even though she didn't exactly _want_ him to make a move. He just... hovered, outside, not making eye contact except when he _did_ , and when he did it was always a knowing little tilt of the head, an acknowledgement that she was looking at him, and nothing more. 

* * *

She was sitting at her desk one morning reading some invitation to a charity event for that very evening that she'd evidently qualified to attend, trying to remember the difference between black tie and white tie, when he came in, almost silent in his socks. "Can I help you?" she asked absently.

"Yes, ma'am," Ransom said, pausing on the carpet. "Um, I think, I think I messed up the laundry."

"The laundry," she said, blankly, still not looking at him.

"Yeah. You asked me to wash the delicates, and um, I kind of fucked up the spin cycle." He shifted from foot to foot, head down, like a naughty child caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

She did look at him then, setting the invitation down. "And…what exactly happened to my _delicates_?" she said, eyes narrowed.

"You'd better come look," he told her, and slunk off into the hall while she huffed in exasperation and set her papers down, stomping after him.

* * *

The laundry room in the basement was well-lit, concrete-floored and stocked with four gleaming front-load machines, one of which was currently spitting out soap and open, revealing a shredded mass of wet fabric, fraying lace, and foam chunks.

"Are these—this—this is _every single one of my bras_ ," Marta gasped, horrified. "What the fuck did you _do_?"

He raised a shoulder and dropped it, looking at the floor. "I've never had to do my own laundry."

"Jesus Christ," she said, dragging out a twisted chunk of fabric. "Are you serious? These are all my underwear, too."

"Do you really need them?" he asked, and Marta turned, jaw clenched. He was leaning against the wall, all languid sarcasm again, and suddenly she knew exactly what he had done.

"You did this on purpose," she said. "You destroyed all my fucking bras and panties, _on purpose_."

His eyes slipped across her. "Maybe," he admitted.

"Come here." She was so angry she couldn't even think. Ransom pushed off the wall and came to her, almost eager, and when he got within three feet she lunged out and slapped him across the face as hard as she could, leaving a red handprint from jaw to temple. Ransom's mouth dropped open in a shocked O, and he staggered back, staring at her. "I have a charity dinner to attend tonight, you idiot."

"So you just…won't be wearing underwear," he suggested, a flush of excitement spreading across his cheeks. One hand reached down to adjust himself, and to Marta's disgust she saw that he was hard. "Nobody—nobody'll know. Just you. And—and me."

"As if I give a shit what you know," she snarled.

"You oughta be nicer to me," he said, the flush deepening. "Maybe I have a secret stash."

Marta gaped. She couldn't believe her ears. "Excuse me? If you're jerking off to stolen fucking bras, _my_ stolen bras, I'm going to beat your ass." Ransom let out a small breath. His eyes were dilated and wide, and she suddenly realized that this was like—it was like crack for him, to be punished for something, anything. " _Did_ you jerk off to my bras?" she asked, voice gone quiet.

"No," he admitted, sounding strangled. "I haven't—haven't jerked off at all. Since. Since you and I—"

"Seriously?" she asked, stunned. "Over a month?"

Ransom looked slightly uncomfortable, but still flushed. "Yeah. You said—anyway, I just, I just thought it was, um, a good idea."

"A good idea," she echoed. "Where. Are. My Bras?"

"I'll tell you if you slap me again," he said, and shut his mouth instantly, looking stricken, like maybe he thought he'd pushed it too far.

Marta snatched up the closest thing to a weapon in the room, a screwdriver lying on the floor, and held it to his throat, backing him into a wall. "You," she hissed, "are not getting a fucking thing from me until you go and _get my bra_."

Ransom shuddered, half-melting under her hands, and when she shifted her weight her thigh pressed up against his erection, still fully hard beneath his canvas coveralls. Disgusted, Marta threw the screwdriver into a corner and shoved him away. _Nothing_ was going to work: he was such a masochist that anything she could threaten him with was only going to turn him on more, and she was sure it was especially bad since he hadn't had an outlet for his frustrations in over a month. _I'd like to string him up from the ceiling and—and—_

"I'm s-sorry," Ransom was saying, edging for the door. "I'll—I'll go get—"

"Go get the riding crop upstairs in the hall closet," Marta said, cold and final, and Ransom looked at her with an expression that made her think maybe he was about to have a stroke. "Put it upstairs in my room. Then _get the hell_ out of my house, and finish the weeding before you call the repair guys to fix the washer you broke."

"Y-yes, yeah, Ms. Cabrera, yeah, okay," he stammered, and left so fast she thought she might have missed it if she'd blinked.

* * *

The charity dinner was extremely boring. Marta realized she completely understood why so many rich people did cocaine and other bullshit: if she'd been coked out of her mind, the evening would have been a lot more fun. What _was_ fun was thinking about the ways she was going to deal with Ransom when she got home. She had gone entirely undergarment-free for the night, and she thought she looked good: her slinky gown a blue so dark it was almost black, red lipstick, tasteful diamond necklace Cartier had sent over to have her wear for the night. She wondered what Ransom would think of the new look, and then reminded herself that she didn't care what he thought: he was nobody, and she hated him—

No. She could not throw up in a room full of people. _Don't think about him_ , she thought, focusing on anything else, anything but his scruffy face and the puppy-dog eyes and the way his face had turned that gorgeous shade of rose when he'd—

Except now she was wet under the dress, bare to the air, probably staining the silk lining of the dress she had on. _Fuck,_ she thought, squirming slightly. What was he doing right now? Waiting for her to come back? Totally uncaring that she'd gone? _Probably trying not to jerk off to the thought of me nude under this dress._ For some reason, the thought of Ransom Drysdale sitting on his hands in an attempt to not touch himself made her suddenly stand. She didn’t have to be here, not for another second if she didn't want to: she was rich and didn't have to do anything she didn't like.

* * *

The house was empty when she arrived home, Mama gone off to some party at a friend's, and that was just as well, because Marta was practically vibrating with pent-up frustration. She stalked up the stairs in her heels, looking for Ransom.

He was in her bedroom, of course; there was nowhere else he would be. She opened the door to find him sitting in her armchair, wearing his worn blue coveralls and holding a crystal tumbler of amber-colored liquid that Marta immediately recognized as the Glenfiddich from the downstairs decanter. This was a transgression that could not go unanswered, and what was more, he knew it, because he had already drunk half the glass, and his socked feet were tapping on the carpet as if in anticipation.

"Get up," said Marta loudly, startling Ransom out of his seat. He almost dropped the glass, but saved it, managing to spill the rest of the scotch on his coveralls. "Is that Harlan's 1940 batch?"

"Yes," he said, mopping uselessly at the stain. Then he looked at her, really looked at her, and took in the gown and the shoes and the diamonds, and every movement ground to a halt sharply, like some essential gear that powered his movement had fallen out of place.

Marta raised an eyebrow. "I hope you're not drunk. I had plans."

"Jesus Christ," he said hoarsely as he sent down the glass. "No. I'm not."

"Good." She picked up the letter opener from her nightstand and weighed it in one hand, then lunged across the room and knocked him back into the chair, one heeled foot pressed into his inner thigh and one hand holding the point to his throat. "That was _my booze_."

"Oh, oh, fuck," Ransom's eyes were practically rolling back in his head, and both hands faced her in surrender as the letter opener dug into the tender skin under his jaw. "Marta. _Marta_ —" The point pressed deeper, and he stuttered as he corrected himself. "Ms. Ca—ma'am—"

"Do you think I want to hear you talk?" she demanded, and he shook his head, eyes half-shut. Marta wiggled her foot, and felt the length of him already full and rock-solid under the dirty coveralls. "You like this, huh? She adjusted the grip of the letter-opener, and Ransom gurgled faintly. "Something tells me you'd like me to cut you a little. Just enough. Maybe to see some blood."

" _Fuck,_ " he grunted, and opened his eyes, looking at her like she was some kind of answer to his prayers. "Are you trying to kill me?"

She almost laughed at the irony of that. "No. You tried to kill me. Keep it straight. Where's my riding crop?"

"On—on the, the, the dresser," he managed, swallowing hard.

"Good." She removed her foot, and he sat up almost instantly, looking as if he'd been smacked across the head with an anvil. "Get out of those fucking coveralls. Strip down. All the way. And go stand by the bed."

Ransom did not need to be told twice. With fumbling, frantic speed, he jerked off his clothes from top to bottom as Marta strode over to the riding crop and inspected it. It was old, well-worn leather, and the keeper at the end was flexible and soft as her hand. _Yeah, this'll do,_ she thought, and turned around to see a very naked, very ready Ransom, waiting at the foot of the bed, facing her with an expression on his face that was indecipherable, but probably terror, excitement, or a mixture of both.

"Do I need to tie you to the foot, or can you control yourself enough to stay where you are?" she asked, idly thumbing the leather tongue.

Desire warred with pride all over his handsome, awful face. "I can. Stay. On my own," he ground out.

Marta lifted her chin and narrowed her eyes. "Show me."

Ransom turned, baring his back to her, and reached from side to side, gripping the mahogany bedposts of the four-poster, spread out like Jesus on the cross. Marta could not tear her eyes away from his back. There was a very faint discoloration on the upper shoulder that could have been an old deep-tissue injury, but besides that, his back was a flawless, leanly muscled landscape between both outstretched arms, which flexed with their own tight muscle.

Oh, how she wanted to absolutely _fuck it up._

"Good," she said, and didn't miss the tremor that went through him. "You stay right where you are, or I'll have to tie you down." Something else wiggled and niggled at the back of her mind. "Do you need a safeword?"

"Go," he rasped, and for a moment she thought he was telling her to leave, but then he clarified. "The game. Go."

Marta snorted. "That's a stupid safeword. Your safeword is _komi_."

"Komi," he repeated, and she watched some of the tension visibly leave his body as he ruminated on the meaning: the points given to the white player as compensation for having the second move, since black went first in _Go_. "Okay. Got it. Now when are you gonna—"

The crop whistled through the air and struck the skin across his upper back, and Ransom jerked in shock, then gasped in air, trembling between the posts. "Stop talking," Marta said, shifting her weight from side to side as she watched the mark deepen in color. "I said I didn't want to hear it."

"Yes—ma'am," he choked, and shook as another blow landed across his tender lower back, then another across his shoulder blade. Marta was afraid she was going too hard, but he didn't breathe a word of protest, not even as she marked across his ass and up again across his shoulders. Over and over she struck him, and as she lifted up after about the fifteenth blow, there was a slight shift—a flutter, and too late as she was putting her back into another swing she realized that the keeper on the end of the crop, old and worn with age, had fallen off, and without the keeper, she was wielding a leather-covered, stiff switch.

A scarlet line carved itself into Ransom's right flank, and his spine buckled inward, his waist twisting as he _screamed._

"Oh, shit, shit, _shit_ ," Marta gasped, almost dropping the crop.

" _No_ ," he panted, half-crazed, turning to look at her with both hands still clamped onto the bedposts, "don't stop, _don't stop_ , do it again do it again—"

Well, she didn't need to be told twice, and really, it was _his_ choice. Marta resumed whipping him, putting patterns of overlapping, crossing crimson, broken lines into his stupid, perfect back, and Ransom cried and moaned and screamed, but he never moved, not even once, from his spot, both hands trembling, every tendon and bone standing out in relief as his shoulders heaved.

When blood started trickling from his welts, she paused, and walked around to the side of the bed.

Ransom was sweating, his face tear-stained, and wearing an expression of desperate bliss. "Please," he choked out.

"Please what?" she demanded.

He sucked at his bottom lip and focused on her, eyes red and wet, as he took a moment to remember how to talk again. "You c-could, uh, you could whip my chest if you, if you want, you could make me b-bleed there, and, and, um, you could s-slap me, like you did this morning, I can't, I can't stop thinking about it—"

"God, you're hopeless," she said, letting the disgust bleed into her face.

"Let me, let me eat you out," he said, eyes lighting up. "Oh, God, Marta. Please. If you let me under that fucking dress, I swear I'll make you come, I will, and then m-maybe I'll deserve—" His mouth pressed into a line, and he looked away, chest shuddering with uneven breaths.

"You'll deserve what?" she snapped, poking him with the crop, making him look at her with the end jammed under his chin.

"Any of this. All of this. You." His eyes were so blue, so wild, darting all over her, that frenetic energy still pent-up.

Marta considered the offer. True, she could use an orgasm right about now, but wouldn't it be nice to just draw it out for a little, see how long he could stand it? "You want to put your dick in me, don't you?"

Ransom's eyes flashed down and to the left. "No—"

The crop went from bottom to top, leaving a red, raised line from his ribs to his nipple. Ransom choked on his own words, and Marta grabbed him by the throat. "Don’t lie to me, you piece of shit."

"Yes. _Yes_." He was almost sobbing, shaking under her fingers: his cock was so hard the head was dark red, almost purple. "Yes, I want, I want—"

"I don't care what you want," she said ruthlessly, and slapped him across the face as hard as she could, not giving him a moment to savor it before she brought the crop back down on the other side of his chest. She broke the thin skin over his right collarbone, and blood trailed down in a thin, wet line from chest to navel as Ransom writhed in place, gasping. "Get on your knees if you want some more." He obeyed immediately, crouching down on the carpet with his elbows on the floor, his knees apart. "Look at that. You _can_ listen when properly motivated."

"I hate you," he said, in a very unsteady voice.

Maybe he was trying to goad her into further punishment. Maybe he was being sincere. Either way, she answered by stepping around the bed and putting her Louboutin heels directly in front of his face. "I seem to remember you offering to lick the dirt off my feet when you first got here. I think I scuffed my heels on the way in. Do be a dear and clean it up."

Ransom exhaled sharply, his breath fogging the gleaming leather, and slowly, slowly pressed his mouth to the toe of her shoe, licking at the non-existent scuff mark there. Well, his mouth was occupied, and she had thoughts to share. "I wonder if you could come just from being slapped around," she mused, looking down at him. "Maybe if I just whipped you enough, made you bleed a little more—"

"I told you," he said, lifting his mouth from her heel, "that—that was a fluke—"

She raised an eyebrow. "I don't know. I'm not sure it was. I mean, you said yourself you haven't come in weeks, and it looks to me like you're really struggling down there." Ransom's jaw flexed, the muscle bunching under his skin in tight knots. "In fact, I think you might be almost as wet as I am."

He raised his head, flushed with the exhilaration of embarrassment, and with the pride in having made her confess how turned on she was. " _Please_ —"

Marta caught his neck with the stiletto heel and slowly, firmly, shoved his head to the floor. Ransom went half-limp, submitting, and she traced the lines she'd whipped into his back with the tip of the crop, making him shudder in anticipation. "You'd let me do anything I wanted to you, wouldn't you?"

"Yes," Ransom croaked, fingers clutching the thick pile of the carpet. Blue eyes darted upward. "For now," he amended, stubborn to the last.

"Yeah," she responded, flicking the crop with just enough power to get his attention. "Yeah, until you get what you want, and then it starts all over again, you seeking out your next high, the next power struggle. You're like an addict." _Snap_ went the crop, and Ransom gasped, high and thin, as he buried his face back in the carpet. "Here's the deal. I'm going to beat the _shit_ out of you for a minute straight. If you can manage not to come, you can get your mouth under this dress and do your worst."

He twisted around to look up at her again. "Deal," he said, thin and tight.

"Oh, no, you misunderstand," said Marta, very coolly. "You don't get to agree. You get to do as I say and take what I give you."

Ransom's response was lost to the carpet as she pressed back down on his neck and brought the crop down over his skin with as much force as she could, spurred on not only by how pissed she still was that he'd stolen her bras to elicit this whole thing instead of just fucking _asking_ , but somehow the fact that he was resolutely not using his safeword gave her enough balls to really put her back into it. Her arm was aching, and he was writhing and gasping as the time ticked away. Both of his thighs tensed and flexed, his hips subtly pressing against the carpet, and she whipped the soft skin behind his right armpit, making him yell in agony and curl one knee up. " _Fuck—"_

Marta shook her head. "None of that. You've just added thirty seconds to your time."

His voice was shaking, pleading. "Marta—"

Another lash split the tender flesh behind his left shoulder, and Ransom howled, hands balling into the carpet as a thin trickle of blood curved down his arm in a slow, lazy trail. "I _said_ , thirty seconds."

The crop came down again and again, and Ransom sobbed and drooled and just took it, took it lying there on his face under the pressure of her foot until the time was up, and she stepped back, reveling in the crisscrossed pattern of pink, red, and bleeding lines across his back as he lay there, back heaving as he gasped for breath. "Please," he begged, broken and thick and wet, "please, Marta, I didn't come. I didn't. I didn't come."

"Sit up," she ordered, and he obeyed instantly, swaying slightly, as if drunk with the success he'd pulled off. His cock jutted up from between his thighs, still rock-solid, flushed purple by now, and slick with dripping precum. "Oh, that looks painful. Poor thing." She poked it with the crop, and Ransom squirmed, shuddering. "I should buy a cage for you to keep that in for me."

On a better day, Ransom could have spat, _why bother, you never use it anyway,_ but he was too far gone to put anything coherent together. "Please," he panted, eyes shut tight. "Please."

"Oh, all right." Marta figured she'd done a fantastic job of hiding exactly how aroused she was at the entire spectacle: naked, battered Ransom at her mercy, begging to be allowed to eat her out. She spread her legs, got on the bed, and set the crop aside. "Get up here. Do your job."

Ransom staggered forward on his knees, dragging himself to the apex of her thighs, and with a moan he yanked aside the dark blue silk of her gown and shoved his mouth, sloppy and open and hot, onto her soft, open flesh. His hands remained delicately trembling at her knees, but Marta leaned back and moaned, thighs taut on either side of his ears, as his tongue delved deep into her and his lips moved hard across her clit, sending shocks of sensation up her spine, and it turned out she was a lot closer than she'd thought she was, because within a minute she was experiencing a spine-ripping, bright, clear orgasm that made it feel like her legs were turning to jelly and her head was exploding. "Ransom!" she cried, planting one hand in his thick dark hair as she rocketed through it. "Fuck, _fuck_ , Ransom."

There had been no permission or instructions given as to the positions or tasks of hands, and Ransom took advantage of that to slip a shaking finger past her slick folds and up to her clit, rubbing circles into her as she came down. Pleasure quickly turned to oversensitivity, and she shoved him away roughly, then slapped him on the cheek, more out of annoyance than anger. "Too much—"

" _Shit,_ " Ransom gasped, and curled forward, and too late Marta realized she had quite literally slapped him into a choking, shaking orgasm, his dick dribbling all over the place as he sobbed his way out of it, his chest heaving and gleaming with sweat. He collapsed to the floor on all fours, his hands limply scrabbling at the carpet with nerveless fingers as he tried to get air into his wrecked lungs.

She wanted to lie back on the cover of the bed, but Ransom was heaving himself back up, crawling towards her about two feet, and then he half-fell on one knee, his head in her lap, hot and damp with tears. Automatically, her hand went to his hair, stroking gently, and Ransom, trembling, moaned something hot and damp against her belly, but she couldn't make out the words past the desperate gasping, and then she could. "Marta," he was sobbing, "thank you. Thank you. Marta. Thank you."

They lay there for a minute, until he stopped crying, and Marta stirred first, taking her hand out of his hair. "Go shower," she said wearily, startling Ransom out of a half-doze. "I'll—I'll put Neosporin on the cuts after."

When he spoke, his voice was thick and tired. "I'd like—an ice pack. If that—if it's—"

"Yes, that's okay." Marta put her hand back, allowing herself to revel in the thick softness of his dark hair: how silky it was without all the product that he had used to sculpt it with. "Come on. Let's—let's go shower."

* * *

The lipstick came off in smears of deep red pigment over Marta's cheeks as she scrubbed her face with makeup remover, her gown stuck to her body with humidity as Ransom sat on her in-bathroom vanity stool and took inventory of the cuts and bruises in the mirror as the shower ran hot. "Get in," she said, and he obeyed, silent and stiff, limping to the shower.

The hiss that burst from between his teeth as the hot water hit his back was loud enough to make Marta turn around. "Wait. You need a cold shower." She shook her head and crossed over, fiddling with the knobs as Ransom gritted his teeth under the stream. "Hot water will increase bloodflow, and you don't want that."

"Okay," he said, shivering as the water ran cool over his shoulders. "It—it does feel good."

She had gone down and gotten the first-aid kit from the linen closet, and now she set everything out with the precision of a surgeon: latex gloves, antiseptic spray, Neosporin, gauze, some medical tape for the deeper cuts, a crack-and-shake ice pack. The diamond Cartier necklace sat glittering on her vanity, discarded. She should change: the dress was expensive, and she didn't want the humidity to ruin it. "Close your eyes," she said, shrugging out of the straps. "I'm changing." Sure, he'd had his face jammed into her pussy, but that didn't mean she wanted him to see _everything._ Yet.

"Okay," said Ransom, and when she looked, he was dutifully standing there, eyes closed, as pink-stained water puddled at his feet.

He was very quiet. Not in a way that made her think he was upset and giving her silent treatment, but just… placid, the frenetic energy all sapped from him. She changed into a bathrobe and left the dress outside the bathroom on one of her armchairs before coming back in. "You can open your eyes now."

Ransom opened them, and rubbed his nose, sniffing. Both eyes went over her with a quick, appraising expression. "Am I clean enough now?"

Somehow Marta didn't think he was talking about the shower. "Not yet. You need soap." She rolled her sleeves to the elbow and slathered her hands in the bar soap, then gently massaged over the scabbing, broken skin. He did not make a single sound of protest, just went pliable and accepting under her fingers, even though it probably stung like crazy, and when he was rinsed clean, she helped him out, his back stiff and aching.

Marta gave him a towel, put on gloves, and sat him down on her stool again, spraying him down with the antiseptic as if he was a plant she was trying to water. He hissed a little between his teeth, but relaxed as she dabbed Neosporin onto his cuts, then pressed gauze pads over the deepest ones, taping them down carefully. Then she moved to his chest, and sat on the vanity table as he let her clean the single deep cut over his clavicle, and bandage that one too. "And these," she said, handing him two pills and a glass of water.

"What is it?" he asked, wincing.

"Motrin. You'll thank me at 3 am, when you're asleep and not awake."

He took the pills, threw them back, and gulped the water, then drank another three full glasses with some mild prompting from Marta. "You don't want to get dehydrated," she told him, cleaning up her workstation as she pressed the ice pack to the worst of the cuts. "And you need to rest. Probably on one side."

"I'll do that." He got to his feet, slightly shakily, and she sighed, thinking about him limping all the way back to the gardener's shed to sleep on some rickety—

"You can stay here." The words were out before she could stop them, and he turned, looking at her with a puzzled expression.

"Rule One," he said. "I don't sleep in here, in the house, with you. Is this—a test?"

"No," said Marta, recovering her footing. "No. If there's a wasp in a house I like to know where it is. You can sleep in my room."

He paused. "In your bed?"

"Yes. Just this once. Don't get comfortable." Marta turned on her heel and walked out of the bathroom, trying to compose herself: she _had_ to maintain control over whatever this was, or—or—

Ransom emerged, damp and bandaged and scruffy, and she pointed to the bed. "You can—get your underwear back on and—"

"I sleep naked," he informed her, and Marta's face went hot.

"Right. Okay. Well. Get in."

He settled stiffly on the bed, lying on his side with a grunt of pain, and she took her robe off, throwing on a ratty old T-shirt and her only clean pair of underwear, a cotton, holey pair of briefs she'd found stuffed into a pocket in a suitcase left over when they'd moved, before lying down on her side, stretching out and looking over at the back of his head. "Well, uh. Sleep well."

"Yeah," he said, and Marta turned the light out.

* * *

_This was a mistake._

Every little movement Ransom made in the dark, Marta thought: _is this it? Is he going to kill me? What have I done?_ She lay awake, hyperaware of even her own breathing, until she couldn't take it anymore and got out of bed, heading back to the bathroom.

"Mmm. Marta?" said a sleepy voice from the bed, accompanied by rustling.

Shit. He had been asleep the entire time, and she was panicking over nothing.

"Go back to sleep," she whispered. "I—I just have to pee." He grunted from the bed, and she raced into the bathroom and shut the door quietly, sliding down against the inside wall and burying the heels of her hands in her eyes.

_I'm never going to be able to sleep without knowing where he is at all times. Oh my God. I'm a mess. Why didn't I make him go sleep in the shed? Would he kill me even after all this? No. He wouldn't kill me for money. Would he?_

It occurred to her that she did know one way to make sure of his whereabouts as she slept, but—

"Fuck," she muttered, kicking her heel against the marble floor. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

* * *

Back in the bedroom, Ransom was still curled up on his side, breathing deeply and softly as Marta crept back in to her side of the bed. She hesitated, then slid in closer to the large curve of his back and shoulders, pressing herself gently against the gauze bandages.

He whimpered a little in his sleep, shifted, then sat up with a groan. "Marta," he said distantly.

Sheepish, she patted at his elbow. "I didn't mean to wake you up."

"No, I always go second," he said faintly.

Marta frowned. "What?"

"Board," he muttered, swaying slightly back and forth. "All my liberties. Hey, Grandpa. The board's still open."

He was talking in his sleep, and Marta felt an unexpected lump form in her throat. This man, this man who had tried to kill her and loathed his own family, who had tried to kill his own grandfather and frame her for it, still dreamed about playing Go with him. "Ransom," she whispered, hand up on his back. "Hey. Come back to bed."

"Huh," he said, and lay down without much fuss, on his other side. This put him in the position of facing her, and one large arm draped itself over her waist as he nuzzled down into her neck. "Mmm."

"Okay," said Marta, slightly frozen in place. "This'll work."

She was answered only by Ransom's soft, heavy breathing, and the boneless sagging of his body into deep sleep, and slowly, Marta let herself fall into dreams.


	3. Chapter 3

The gardener’s shed was moderately clean: wooden floor, rakes and brooms and clippers and various pieces of equipment all on their pegs, waiting to be used. The loft above, where the old gardener had lived until he’d left about ten years ago, had been dusty and grimy when Ransom had moved in, but he’d gotten it clean in the time he’d been here. Some sweeping, dusting, mopping, washing, and the place was almost habitable: he missed the lack of a flatscreen TV and an Echo Dot and WiFi and various other things he’d come to view as necessities, if only for the fact that they’d always been there, until, of course, they hadn’t.

He had a bed, a hot plate, a mini-fridge, a tiny bathroom, a rickety old table and chair, and hideous little curtains brushing the windowsills: it was better than prison, and that was all he could say. Outside, the rain poured down, smattering against the windows and making the view of the trees and the yard just one huge gray-green blur. _No yardwork today,_ he thought, resting on the floor from his fifth set of push-ups. Ransom hated days like this: he got none of the energy out of his system, and he couldn’t even stand outside the windows of the main house without a shirt in hopes that Marta would walk by and see him. He liked giving her shit, as much as he could say he liked anything: it gave him a wicked little thrill to fuck with someone who could fire him with a word, and by now he knew full well she was into it, too. _You’re stuck with me,_ he thought vindictively as he dropped down for another set of push-ups. _Forever and ever._

Not that Ransom exactly liked the idea of being tied to Marta Cabrera and totally dependent on her for his food and housing and…pretty much everything, but if she could pull it off while in Grandpa’s employment for so long, he could damn well do the same. Somehow, thought, he didn’t think that Marta’s relationship with his grandfather _really_ mirrored his relationship with Marta. He shifted uncomfortably, and a twinge of pained pressure between his legs reminded him sharply of the cage locked around his dick. _Fuck._

Ransom inhaled deeply through his nose, trying to think of anything else but Marta. It had been almost three weeks since she’d marched up to him, holding the fucking thing out, and ordered him to put it on, and he’d obeyed immediately, fingers shaking so hard he’d thought he was going to drop it on the Persian rug in the study. The key was around her neck. He knew that. He’d seen the chain glinting whenever he’d passed her by in the house, or on the grounds. It had been especially visible the day she’d decided to lounge in the fresh spring air by the pool in a silk robe and nothing else, the gold warm in the pale sunlight…

“Fuck,” he said aloud, pressing a hand to his groin with a grimace. He thought about Great-Grandma, about playing Go, about cold soup and prison and a hard mattress: football stats and the alphabet and trivia from every movie he could remember. Gradually, the pressure eased, and a heavy, sinking feeling proclaimed that a spectacular case of blue balls was on the way. Ransom closed his eyes and dragged his hands down his face, trying not to think about how Marta had told him—what had she told him?

_You don’t need that to come._

He wriggled uncomfortably again on the floor, almost savoring the ache as his cock swelled to half-mast and pressed against the warm steel bars. She was going to use that fucking vibrator on him again, wasn’t she? Or—no, if his dick wasn’t going to be involved, maybe she was going to put something up his ass. _God._ Ransom shut his eyes and breathed through his nose for a moment as the thought of Marta’s little fingers just _on_ his ass, let alone _in_. She hadn’t touched him in weeks. Nobody had touched him in weeks, and while he’d always brushed off being touched by people who were gooey about it, he had to admit that his whole body just _wanted_ to be touched, petted, held…

“You’re being a fucking pussy,” he sneered at himself, getting to his feet and pacing around in the confines of the room. When would it stop raining? He needed to get the fuck out of this building. He needed to go for a run, to move, to think about literally anything but—

The door swung open without any type of warning at all, and he stopped short in his tracks as his thoughts all condensed down to one singular sharp and shining point: _Marta Marta Marta._ In the doorway, walking to him, rain-wet and shrugging off her coat, splattering rain across his floor: it was _her._

“Hi,” she said, throwing her coat to the back of the chair. She was holding a bag, a canvas tote or something, but Ransom had no eyes for anything but her wet hair, rain-slick skin, and intent eyes. He should say something, he knew he should, but he couldn’t think of a fucking thing to say.

* * *

Marta couldn’t believe her eyes as she wiped rainwater off her face. Ransom looked half-wrecked already, standing with his legs a little too far apart, his face a little too flushed, his eyes a little too bright, and he was just staring at her like she was the sun. “Hi,” she repeated, slightly slower. She raised an eyebrow: was he okay?

“Oh. Hi,” he said, blinking like she’d whacked him across the face. “You’re here.”

“Uh, yeah. It’s my property.” Marta set her bag on the table. “Surprise. House call.”

“Why are you—what—” He seemed to be struggling to find the words, but his eyes fixed instantly on the chain around her neck as she slid a hand inside it and pulled it out sideways on the crook of her thumb.

“I thought you might want a little fun. If you don’t want to see me, though—”

“ _No,_ ” Ransom choked, shaking his head immediately. “No, no, stay, _please_ , Marta—”

“That’s what I thought.” She crooked her finger at him, and he advanced in an awkward, painful gait until he was standing in front of her. His thin white T-shirt stretched over his broad chest, and his hands were clenched at his sides in some expression of tension she couldn’t really place. Sweat beaded at his temples, the roots of his hair going dark. “Pants off. You better have been cleaning that thing right.”

He undid the fly of his canvas pants and shucked them off frantically, hooking his thumbs into the waistband of his briefs and yanking those off too. “Yeah, I have,” he muttered, sounding disgruntled. Marta looked down, tilting her head and pretending to look critical: his cock was half-hard, swelling through the bars already, and precum dribbled from the tip.

“I don’t know. Looks a little messy.”

“Marta, _fuck,_ ” he muttered, his face flushing from neck to ears as he shifted from side to side.

She flicked the tip of his cock through the bars with a well-placed, manicured nail, and he hissed, one fist shaking. “What was that?”

“ _Please_ ,” Ransom gasped, eyes squeezed shut.

Marta grinned. God, but she liked him like this, all overeager and sputtering and ready to explode. He just needed a little more encouragement. “Please what?”

“Out. Let me. Unlock. The—the—” Ransom sucked his bottom lip between his teeth, groaning as she reached up and touched the heavy, soft weight of his balls under their stainless steel ring. “Cage, _cage,_ Marta—”

“You’re so sensitive,” she said, pretending she hadn’t heard. “I think you missed me. Did you miss me?”

“No,” he growled, and yelped as her fingers squeezed gently around the base of his cock. “ _Yes,_ yes, I missed, _fuck_ , you—”

“Good.” She pulled the chain off over her head and unlocked the cage carefully, drawing it off him and setting it aside, and he moaned audibly in relief, squirming as his dick, freed from its constraints, swelled hard and thick, pointing directly at her. Marta traced the underside with a finger, and Ransom gasped a little, hips jerking as more precum dripped off his warm skin. “Messy,” she commented, and he whimpered, really whimpered like a dog.

“What—what do you—”

“I have a surprise,” she said, and went to the bag she’d put on the table, leaving him standing there in his T-shirt with his erection sticking out from under the hem. He would have looked ridiculous if he didn’t already look so fucking wrecked. Marta reached into her tote and pulled out three items she’d procured from a very expensive online shop—lube, a buttplug, and a black leather strap-on harness. “You know what these are, I hope.”

“Yeah,” Ransom managed, sounding pitiful.

“Good. Take your shirt off, you look like a porn parody of Winnie the Pooh.” She patted the table. “Lay down flat on your chest here, feet on the floor.”

Ransom froze, just for a moment, and then immediately obeyed, stripping his shirt off and advancing on the table, lying down across it, cheek mashed into the shitty pressboard.

“Knees apart,” she prompted, nudging him with her foot, and he dutifully spread his legs. His dick hung, neglected and red, between the edge of the table and his thighs, and Marta gave it a cursory squeeze before slicking her hand with the lube and spreading his ass cheeks.

“Shit,” he said, stiffening at the sensation of cold goop on his asscrack. His erection flagged, just a little. “Marta—”

“It’ll warm up. I tested it myself. Calm down.” She ran her thumb gently over and down, up and back, and when he groaned softly at her touch, relaxing again, she rubbed a little more firmly. “Have to say, you always struck me as a guy way too into manscaping.”

“Surprised?” he croaked back, his one blue eye narrowed and focused on her over his shoulder.

“What, that you found the time to do it here? Not really. You’re incredibly vain and self-obsessed. I guess it was only a matter of time.”

 _That_ got him, and his eyes fluttered shut, his mouth slackening as she worked her index finger past the tight ring of flesh that barred her way. “Marta,” he hissed, shaking a little.

“It might burn. Relax.” Her other hand rubbed circles into his ass, kneading and petting the firm muscle, and after a breath or two Ransom relaxed, allowing her further in, allowing a second finger.

He twitched, his mouth tightening and slackening all over, as if he didn’t know what to do with his face. “It…feels, feels—I didn’t, didn’t—” The visible cheek turned scarlet. “Marta. _Prep._ ”

“You said you thought it wasn’t worth the orgasm,” she said, shrugging as she added another finger, pumping gently. “I’m a nurse. I’ve seen way worse than this.”

“Oh, God,” Ransom choked.

Marta grinned down at him. “Besides, you _are_ a dirty fucking _pig._ ”

Ransom’s whole body convulsed, scooting the table a good two inches forward, and he groaned, legs shaking, as he fought to not—what was he doing? “Oh, God, fuck, _fuck_ ,” he stammered, fingers digging into the cheap tabletop, “if you don’t fucking _fuck me_ I’m going to lose my shit—”

“Ask me nicely,” she shot down, already reaching for the plug.

“Please. _Please_ , Marta, please, please, please just f-fuck—” He couldn’t even make coherent sentences, and she slipped the plug in with hardly any resistance, letting it settle snug and tight inside him. Then she stepped away and headed to the sink, leaving him there spread out over the table.

She washed her hands clean of lube, watching him out of the corner of her eye. Ransom’s glutes tightened and slackened, as if he was testing the waters, and his eyes flickered around the room like he was hyperaware of everything going on, but after they settled on her, his eyes went back to a half-closed, almost trancelike expression, his open mouth sucking in air against the table. She hoped it wasn’t dusty. He might asphyxiate. “You alive?”

“Hanging in there,” he said dryly. “Never got the appeal of these things, really.” Both blue eyes darted up to meet hers as he rolled his chin to rest on the table, the right side of his face imprinted with the pattern on the pressboard.

“Oh? Let me demonstrate, then,” she told him, and walked back around, then pressed down firmly and gently on the base of the plug, nudging it directly against his prostate.

Ransom screamed, literally screamed like a man in a bad horror movie, and both huge arms convulsed where his fingers were wrapped around the edges in a death-grip. “ _Marta no I don’t wanna come I don’t—”_ She let the pressure up, but pushed down rhythmically, soft little bounces against his prostate, and Ransom howled again, both arms pulling _in,_ and the table—

The table fucking broke.

Ransom pitched forward, crashing into the floor as Marta yelled in alarm, falling with him: her first instinct was to protect the vulnerable parts of him that were approaching the floor at terminal velocity, but he twisted in midair, landing hard on his side in the wreckage of the table.

“Shit, _shit_ ,” she gasped, checking him automatically for blood or lacerations. “Are you—”

“Fine,” he rasped, shuddering on the floor. Both eyes snapped open and found hers with an intensity that threatened to burn right through her. “Bed. _Bed._ ”

* * *

Marta yanked the fourth and final item out of her tote: a sleek, light pink dildo. She secured it in her harness, turning to look at Ransom, who she’d ordered to the bed. He was kneeling, staring at her hungrily, undisguised yearning in his eyes as they swept her body. She wasn’t naked. She’d even kept her shoes on, but apparently the sight of her fully clothed with a pale pink dick swinging from her crotch was enough.

“You want it?” she asked, narrowing her eyes as she gripped the base. It wasn’t quite as big as his, but it was large enough for him to eye it up with a little trepidation. Ransom nodded, and she stepped closer, encroaching on his personal space and bringing the dildo to within a foot of his face. “Suck it.”

He looked up instantly, looking almost offended. “The hell—”

“Your mouth,” she demanded, and slapped his cheek with it, prompting him to open his mouth again in indignation, then slipping the tip between his plump lips. Ransom choked, looking up at her with bright, furious eyes, and she grinned. “What? Don’t wanna suck my cock?”

He growled and stared directly into her eyes, jaw clenching like he had something to prove as he exhaled hard through his nose and took it deeper, lips stretching around the pink silicone. Marta raised an eyebrow, genuinely surprised at the reaction, but she was not going to complain about that view. His lips looked _made_ to suck something as they slid up and down the length of her fake cock, and she pushed him lightly, making him sit on his ass and by extension the plug still lodged there.

“Hrrrnnngh,” Ransom groaned out, eyes fluttering shut.

“Easy there,” Marta said, and the way his eyes found hers again, open and teary and the lashes all spiked—well, okay, maybe it was doing something to her. She wasn’t gonna tell him to stop, and he seemed to get the message, because he kept humming through his nose, moaning, his eyes closing and opening as he worked his way down and up, drool slicking the dildo and gleaming on his lips. Marta let him slobber for a little while, then reached for the back of his head, slowly pulling him down all the way. He choked, but breathed through his nose until the tip of the dildo pressed into the back of his throat, and she held him there for five full seconds as he shook and drooled, gagging, before letting him go.

Ransom fell backward, gasping for air, tears streaming down his cheeks. His backside hit the bed, and his hips shifted, a moan escaping his open, wet mouth. “Marta, _please…_ ”

“You ready?” she asked, reaching for the lube again.

“Yeah, yeah—” and he scrambled heavily to roll over, his ass in the air, knees apart and face down in the blankets. She slapped his ass, and he yelped, shoulders bulging with the effort of not lurching off the bed.

“See,” Marta told him, almost lazily as she slicked up the fake cock, “this is why I had to come out here, instead of calling you into the house. You scream like a stuck pig.”

“I can—be good,” he panted, trembling all over. “Marta. I’ll be good. I’ll be good.”

“Maybe,” she said, and teased the plug out gently, walking back to the kitchenette and putting it in the sink. Ransom was waiting right where she’d left him, and she patted his backside approvingly, kneeling up on the bed and pressing the head of her cock to his ass.

Moment of truth: she’d never done this, but the Internet had been incredibly helpful. Ransom stiffened as she traced her other hand across the fading marks on his back. “You gonna fuck me or what?” he asked hoarsely, turning his head to look at her.

“Bossy,” she said, and slapped his ass. He grunted, eyes fluttering shut as she eased the dildo in deeper, almost halfway in before Ransom tensed again. “Easy up,” she said, reaching further up and stroking his hair. He had nice hair, when he did something with it and when he didn’t: soft and brown. “Relax, Ransom.”

He shuddered, his body melting a little, and she thrust her hips forward gently, gently, until the pink cock disappeared into him, the base flush with his body, her hips pressed against his ass. “Marta,” he moaned, every muscle tense. Marta pulled out about an inch and thrust again, and he spluttered, gasping as he writhed under her. “ _Marta_.”

“You want it?” She gave him a shallow little thrust again, and he moaned, lifting his hips in half-aborted movements toward her body. “You have to tell me.” He flashed her a glance, and tried to lift his own ass up to fuck himself on the strap-on, but she shoved him back down, holding his hips to the bed, his dick trapped between his belly and the quilt as she fucked him again, slow and uneven, purposely not setting any rhythm he could get off too—though he might get off anyway, with how desperate he was. “I said. Tell. Me.”

Ranson sucked in a gasp. “Please,” he sobbed, fingers digging into the bed. “Please, please, Marta, fuck me, fuck me, _please_ —”

She obliged willingly, feeding his ass a good couple inches of silicon cock as she pumped in and out, and he bellowed as the tip slammed into his prostate, over and over in a good hard rhythm. “You’re not gonna last long, huh?” she panted, tangling her fingers into his hair and pulling his head back. “Not like this. Not with my cock in your ass—”

Ransom wailed, and jerked himself off the bed in a convulsive movement that left her clinging to his hair and one shoulder to brace herself as he came and came, thick ropes of white come splattering across the quilt. It didn’t stop, and she didn’t stop fucking him through it, and he shook and moaned and went limp after a minute as she brought her arms up to cradle him, his body gone deadweight on his knees. One heavy, weak hand came up, trembling on her wrist. “Marta,” he rasped, head lolling forward, hair stuck to his forehead with sweat. “Th-thank you.”

“Jesus,” she said, laying him down on his side as she pulled the dildo out gently and walked to the sink to dump it. “Maybe I should cage you up more often. I like you grateful.”

He offered a crooked smile, eyes bleary with post-orgasmic sleepiness. “You…” Suddenly, he sat up, all alert and panicked. “You didn’t finish. Shit. I—you—” His hands moved like birds, flapping and convulsing as he looked her over. “You should have—”

“I’m fine,” she said, waving him down and feeling slightly touched. And sure, she was horny, if not just for how flushed and damp and pitiful he looked, then for how eagerly he’d taken her and how quickly he’d come, touch-starved and groveling—but she didn’t _need_ to come, not every time. “I don’t need you right now. Lie down.”

He obeyed, looking half-suspicious as he curled up on his side, facing the room and not the wall. She washed everything in the sink and set it to dry (and wasn’t that a sight, a pink, five-inch cock poking straight up on Ransom’s little plastic dish drainer?) before striding back over and shaking his shoulder. “Hm?” he asked, rousing slightly.

“Quilt. Gotta wash it. You made a mess.”

“Oh,” he said stupidly, and got up with an uncomfortable, awkward gait to let her pull the quilt off the bed. She threw it aside, making a mental note to wash it at the house, and got a blanket out of the closet, spreading it over the sheets.

“You want a shower before you take your nap?” she asked, eyeing Ransom’s naked, sweaty form. He sure looked like he could use one, at any rate.

“Oh,” he said, looking down. “Yeah. Just… give me a second.” Two shuffling steps to the tiny bathroom, and he turned back. “You…gonna leave?”

“No. I’ll stay. Go shower.”

Relief, almost palpable, flooded his face. “Oh.” He turned back around and went in, shutting the door behind him.

* * *

Marta Cabrera, stripped of her shoes, jeans, and sweater, lay down in the tight space between Ransom’s body and the wall behind his bed. He curled onto her like a crescent moon, head nestled in the crook of her shoulder and one heavy arm flung across her waist like an iron bar, and she breathed, and looked at the ceiling, and thought _God, I hope Mama doesn’t come looking for me._


End file.
